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With “American Idol” finals coming next week, does anyone care?

We’re almost at the end of a giant let-down of an “American Idol” season, which saw its 500th episode, historic low ratings and a predicted scheduling downsizing for next year, one of the best truth bomb-y judges to ever sit behind the table and a shockingly green collection of largely unsteady and personality-free kids culled from a field of much better, personable (and older) singers that didn’t quite fit whatever it was the show was going for.

And if they were going for “Shiny Cute Puppies We Have To Remind Weekly To Sing Well In A Singing Competition,” well, kudos and stuff!

Honestly, final two Jena Irene and Caleb Johnson were probably the most engaging of the top finalists, whose number included sweet Alabama boy C.J. Harris, a single dad with a guitar-playing grandpappy and more earnestness than a box full of puppies but a pronounced inability to sing on pitch so profound that it seemed knit into his DNA, and Jessica Meuse, a scowling pink-haired rebel girl who seemed insulted by the suggestion that she, you know, sing the words of the songs she chose like she understood what words meant, while not looking like she wanted to beat up the front row. And those were two of the most popular!

So…Show. You gotta ask yourself….and you can be honest with me, because back in your heyday I covered this thing so completely and diligently that I planned stuff around it, to the point where I stayed late at the live simulcast of the Fantasia/Diana DeGarmo final in Jupiter and was very late picking up a very cute friend from the airport who’d come to visit – a friend who later told me, not in a happy way, that he’d been considering taking our relationship to the next level but had been disenchanted that “American Idol” was more important than him. I mean, it was my job and all, and he wasn’t the right guy and I’m married and happy and que sera and all.

But you kinda owe me one, Show. So I’m asking you very honestly – is this what you want? You used to boast that your aim was no less lofty a goal than to find the best singers in America – in the right age range, of course. And for a while, it looked like you were serious, because you can’t argue with the finds that are winners Carrie Underwood, Kelly Clarkson and Fantasia. Heck, even contest losers like Chris Daughtry and Jennifer Hudson have made a lot of noise. But did you look back over the flashy montage you made yourself for the 500th episode, that showed the highlights of your life, the Kellys and the Carries, and then look side-eyed at the collection of little untested, charmless children that you threw at us this year, and realize that you’d made a mistake? That besides Caleb and Jena and maybe Alex, there are very few contenders that you’d come early to see open for your favorite singer, let alone go see on their own? That as demo-friendly as they were, you forgot to make sure they could sing, or that they could connect to a song, a live audience, a public? That they didn’t have to be coached through basic musical lessons at a stage when they should be making their awesome more awesome?

I sure did. And I know you were renewed, even with a downgraded place on the schedule. America’s moved on from your phenom days, but you’ve still got a shot. Maybe you won’t be what you used to be, but don’t you want to do more than not suck? Don’t you want to honor the gems you’ve got in your judges who actually judge, like sweet Keith Urban and brutal overlord of charming truth Harry Connick, Jr.. with some contestants who are worth their advice? (JLo’s OK, too.)

Don’t you want to not insult the public who saw the better singers in the early rounds by maybe giving them a chance, even if they’re older than 22, because your rules say they can be even if your selection process doesn’t? Don’t you want to pay Randy Jackson whatever you owe him and get him the heck away from you, or else require him to actually mentor these kids like he’s supposed to and show him doing it?